II.2. Material y métodos
II.2.5. Análisis estadístico
The state in Cameroon, dating back to the colonial era, has demonstrated a penchant for striving to usurp all other societal interests in the land domain. The country’s first colonial rulers, the Germans, proceeded early
56 Guerin v the Queen [1984] 2 S.C.R. 335.
during their brief colonial tenure in Cameroon to enact a series of laws designed to achieve this goal. Prominent in this regard, is the Act of 15 July 1896, which converted all so-called ‘unoccupied lands’ into property of the German colonial state. The converted lands were in turn, placed at the disposal of private German farmers who used it for plantation agriculture.
Subsequent administrations, following the ousting of the Germans from the country after World War I, adhered to the aggressive land acquisition blue print left behind by the German colonial authorities. The French who controlled four-fifths of Cameroon as a Trust Territory of the League of Nations, enacted a law in 1932 – a facsimile of the 1896 German colonial government Act – classifying all vacant lands as ‘terres vacantes et sans maïtres’ and converting same into property of the French colonial state.
On their part, the British enacted a law 1927 the Land and Native Rights Ordinance, classifying as ‘native land’ all land in the British Mandate Territory. This classification was deceptive because the so-called native lands were placed under the control of the colonial governor of Nigeria, who could in turn do as he chose with the land.
The actions of the post-colonial state in the land domain have mirrored those of its colonial predecessors. The country’s 1974 landmark land law was designed to consolidate the state’s power. According to Ordinance No 74-1 of the Law, not only is the state the guardian of all lands, it is also endowed with the powers to use the land as it sees fit in the interests of the nation at large. More importantly, the post-colonial governments have been less tolerant of, and even oblivious to, customary entitlements to land. The state recognises only formal instruments of land ownership, particularly a government-issued land certificate, and the concomitant registration of such title in the National Land Register. These and other requirements and behaviour of the government in the land domain has heightened land-related tensions, which manifest the continuing struggle over legitimacy and control over valuable resources between the state and society.57
Since the 1990s, and as part of efforts to fulfill its obligations under the Structural Adjustment Programmes of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, the Government of Cameroon has proceeded to unilaterally privatise the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC) and its assets. This action has triggered a flurry of reactions especially from the Bakweri, whose ancestral lands are occupied by CDC’s estates. Thus, the Government decision to privatise the CDC fuelled the longstanding Bakweri land problem.
57 Njoh (n 13 above); Njoh (n 28 above); Z Ergas (ed) The African state in transition (1987);
G Feder & R Noronha ‘Land rights systems and agricultural development in sub Saharan Africa’ (1987) 2 Research Observer.
This chapter has retraced the evolution of this problem from the German colonial era, through the creation of the CDC in 1946 to date. The Bakweri acted through their accredited agent, the Bakweri Land Claims Committee (BLCC), to thwart, at least temporarily, the Government’s effort to privatise the CDC. To accomplish this feat, the BLCC addressed a barrage of letters to national, regional and international entities asserting the customary land rights of the Bakweri over the lands in question, and protesting what it views as the state’s callous disregard of these rights. In October 2002, the BLCC filed a formal complaint against the Government of Cameroon at the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) in Banjul. In its communication to the ACHPR under articles 55, 56,and 58 of the African Charter, the BLCC prayed the Commission to find that by refusing to affirm the rights of Bakweri people over the lands occupied by the CDC, the Government of Cameroon has violated some fundamental human rights of these people. The BLCC further urged the Commission to recommend that the Government makes a good faith effort to resolve the longstanding Bakweri land problem. Despite a motion for dismissal from the Government, the Commission not only entertained the case, but also found in favour of the BLCC.
This case has implications that transcend Cameroon’s frontiers, holding important lessons for indigenous groups whose lands have been expropriated by the state elsewhere. One can only hope that international organs such as the ACHPR are not toothless barking dogs, but, upon finding in favour of the Bakweri, the Commission did not lay down any mechanism to implement its recommendations. What authority does the Commission have over Cameroon as a sovereign nation? What if the Government were to invoke its police power to employ the land in question? The country’s landmark land law provides for such invocation of the police power of the state. Although the BLCC appears oblivious to this possibility, it recognises the apparent inability of the Commission to compel the Government of Cameroon to implement its recommendations, and is consoled by the fact that the Commission has confirmed the legitimacy of its case. Furthermore, as the BLCC notes, the Commission has the authority to forward the matter to the African Union Assembly should the Cameroonian Government fail to take the steps necessary to implement its recommendations.
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